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The Moderating Role of Transformational Leadership in
the Relationship Between Attitude Towards Diversity
and Individual Creativity
by
Stephanie ten Brink
University of Groningen
Faculty of Economics and Business Master Thesis, Human Resource Management
2 ABSTRACT
Creativity is crucial in today’s competitive society, in order to remain competitive. This research focuses on the relationship between an employees’ attitude towards diversity and individual creativity. In addition, the moderating role of a transformational leadership has been included. It was hypothesized that a positive relationship exists between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity, as well as between transformational leadership and individual creativity. After analyzing data from 84 employees and 20 supervisors it appeared there was no evidence for the first hypothesis, whereas the second hypothesis was accepted. When transformational leadership was high there was no relationship between the two other variables, however, creativity did remain high under a negative as well as under a positive attitude. Under low transformational leadership, a strong relationship was found between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity. The theoretical and managerial implications of these findings are discussed.
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INTRODUCTION
Workforces have become more diverse because of globalization, an increase in employment of women in organizations, more pronounced age differences, more and more immigrants. Moreover, the continuously changing environment leads companies to demand people from various educational and professional backgrounds (Landau, Landau and Landau, 2001). How to manage this diversity and preferably, how to reap the benefits of having a diverse workforce is a challenge and an opportunity faced by many businesses. One of these opportunities refers to the often researched case of diverse teams possessing the potential for higher creativeness and innovativeness than do homogenous teams (e.g Van Knippenberg & Schippers, 2007). Maintaining your position in the market requires innovative and creative thinking to reach sustainable growth, and to remain competitive (Oldham and Cummings, 1996; Amabile, 1998; Tierney, Farmer & Graen, 1999; Jung, Chow, & Wu, 2003). In addition, environmental changes force companies to continuously introduce new products and services in order to survive (Tushman & Oreilly, 1997; Florida, Cushing & Gates, 2002). Therefore, organizations are becoming highly reliant on their creative personnel. The role of the leader in this interplay between diversity and creativeness will become crucial. The manner in which the leader chooses to manage its diverse subordinates could potentially be a determining factor for the overall creativity within the team. The knowledge of which leadership style is most appropriate to manage diversity and to enhance creative potential in individuals should support corporations everywhere. In addition, understanding these creativity dynamics, is a high priority for researchers as well (Zhou & Shalley, 2008).
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hand, diversity has been claimed to lead to positive outcomes such as enhanced creativeness. On the other hand, negative outcomes such as increased conflict are also frequently observed diversity drawbacks. This leads to the common notion of diversity being regarded as a ‘double-edged sword’. Still, more clarity is required in determining those contingencies under which diversity will result in the most significant gains for the team. The important moderating role in this relation is also stressed by Williams and O’Reilly (1998), Van Knippenberg, De Dreu and Homan (2004), Van Knippenberg and Schippers (2007). Basset-Jones (2005) goes as far as saying that by embracing diversity a risk is taken with regard to conflict, whereas ignoring diversity is losing ‘competitive advantage’.
Increased attention, though still not much attention, is being paid to the role of transformational leaders in stimulating creativity of their subordinates (Bass, 1985; Sosik, Avolio & Kahai, 1997; Shin & Zhou, 2007). According to Bass (1990), leadership is the predominant factor in determining the effectiveness within teams. Transformational leaders are said to ‘articulate a realistic vision of the future that can be shared, stimulates subordinates intellectually, and pays attention to the differences among the subordinates’ (Yammarino & Bass, 1990: 151). Therefore, this particular leadership style is relevant for the present study since it has been said to be a creativity enhancing factor. Moreover, the definition describes the attention that these leaders pay to within group differences which is especially applicable to the diversity parameter of this research. Thus, the moderating role of a transformational leader can shape up to be the overriding factor in reaping the benefits of a diverse workforce and specifically, higher levels of creativity.
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mentioned, is still increasing and a significant part of businesses all across the globe. Adding to the relevance is the element of creativity and transformational leadership, since it is of vital importance for companies to realize how leaders should effectively manage employees with a positive or negative attitude towards diversity and how to enhance creative potential. Therefore clarity on these issues should have important (managerial) implications for businesses. Thus, this paper strives to clarify current issues which are highly relevant for the survival of companies in today’s competitive environment.
THEORY
Attitude towards diversity and individual creativity
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1996). Therefore, the simple distinction is that creativity is on the individual level and innovation on the team level (Oldham & Cummings, 1996), hereby explaining the focus on individual creativity in this paper. This is in line with the attitude towards diversity concept, since this is also set on an individual level.
The concept of attitude towards diversity is largely unexplored, with Montei, Adams and Eggers (1996) probably delivering the most significant contribution. The majority of studies has focused on actual diversity within a team, and not on attitude towards diversity per se. This paper provides a next step towards more clarity in this area. It is hereby first important to define the construct adequately. I adopt the definition of Montei et al. (1996: 295) which argues that attitude towards diversity can be defined as ‘the degree to which one tends to accept minorities, primarily women and non-Whites, in the workplace (…) this includes acceptance of such individuals as co-workers and supervisors and any other persons in work-related roles’.
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with the team (Milliken & Martins, 1996). Hence, the ‘double-sword’ notion of diversity as was mentioned in the beginning.
Literature on diversity so far has argued that the relationship between diversity and creativity is highly contingent (Milliken & Martins, 1996; Jackson, Joshi & Erhardt, 2003). To be more precise, heterogeneity among employees provides the potential for creativity, and the actual realization of creativity depends on other contextual or personal factors. In this research transformational leadership forms such a factor. As was already briefly mentioned in the preceding paragraph, by pooling different perspectives and knowledge bases, creative solutions could be enhanced. This is because creativity requires the consideration of various perspectives in order to find new solutions and the act of combining processes or products that were unrelated before (Mumford & Gustafson, 1988; Amabile, 1996). In addition, this is also confirmed by decision-making theorists, who suggest that diversity leads to increased cognitive processing and better use of information and therefore, to a higher level of creativity (Watson, Kumar & Michaelsen, 1993). Therefore, diversity could result in potential sources of creativity (Jackson & Alvarez, 1992). Horwitz and Horwitz (2007) refer to an experiment in the sixties which examined problem solving creativity of pairs and proves to be evidence for this ‘creative potential’. It turned out that dyads with differing attitudes and perspectives had higher creative capacity than dyads who were more alike (Triandis, Hall & Ewen, 1965). Francesco and Gold (2005) describe the advantages of group diversity in increased creativity, enhanced concentration to understand others, and an increased development of ideas, perspectives, meanings, and arguments.
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In line with Bouncken, Ratzmann and Winkler (2008), I reason that because of this negative attitude, the individual employee is less open to accept the ideas and other input of co-workers who differ from them. Thereby, relying solely on one’s own often deeply ingrained thought patterns, while valuable input of others with different perspectives could have enhanced the creativity level of that individual. A positive attitude towards diversity on the other hand, could prove to be a source of creativeness. As Bouncken et al. (2008) reason, by acknowledging differences between members and thereby the different knowledge and cognitive models, one is able to make use of a ‘higher knowledge base’ to tap into and use to enhance one’s own creativity. Van Oudenhoven et al. (2009) argue that by sharing beliefs, a climate of mutual understanding and confidence can be established and that learning from each other is then more likely. Homan, van Knippenberg, van Klee and de Dreu (2007) have found that a positive attitude, when induced by experimental manipulation, led to overcome negative outcomes of faultlines on group performance. This goes along with an ‘automatic tendency to engage in exchange of unique work-related information, rather than to categorize fellow group members as out group members’ according to Van Oudenhoven et al. (2009: 260). Thus, reflecting more openness towards others, and at the same time better use of input of co-workers, hence the potential for higher individual creativity. Van Oudenhoven et al (2009: 276) conclude their research by saying that ‘diverse groups may only be able to benefit from their creative potential when they actually believe in the favorable outcomes of diverse groups’.
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H1: A positive attitude towards diversity results in higher individual creativity.
Individual creativity and transformational leadership
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recognition and encouragement, enhancing exploratory thinking, by providing support for innovation and creativity, by delegating and supporting autonomy and by providing encouragement into the idea generation process. All of which are determinants for innovative and individual creativity (Bass & Avolio, 1995, Sosik et al, 1998: 113). In addition, when a transformational leader is able to create a feeling of self-efficacy, creativity is also enhanced. (Mumford & Gustafson, 1988, Bass, 1990; Redmond, Mumford & Teach, 1993).
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(Gumusluoglu & Ilsev, 2009). Also, as Weisberg (1999) indicates it takes time for individuals to acquire and process new knowledge in order to produce creative solutions. These results do call for more research in this area, which also was suggested by Mumford and Licuanan (2004), about whether followers creativity is enhanced by transformational leadership. Although two studies found contradicting results, the majority of studies all agree on the relation between transformational leadership and individual creativity. The specific features that belong to this leadership style as were mentioned above, have with the exception of these two studies, all found to be creativity enhancing factors. The second hypothesis therefore can be formulated as follows:
H2: Transformational leadership leads to higher individual creativity
The moderator role of transformational leadership
Shin and Zhou (2003) as was already mentioned, also researched the moderating role of transformational leadership with regard to diversity. They included educational heterogeneity, which resulted in higher creativity when transformational leadership was high and educational heterogeneity was high. The effect of transformational leadership is dependent on the context, this study places transformational leadership in the diversity context. The present research differs from this in that the focus of Shin and Zhou (2003) was on actual work group diversity instead of attitude towards diversity.
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(1999). They argue that the transformational leader can also stress and emphasize the need for creative ideas, which can make the individual more receptive and acceptant towards diversity. He or she is able to put a positive view on the differences within the group and stress the positive aspects of working with dissimilar employees. Thereby, creating a more positive image towards diversity.
A team leader is also able to enhance the social identification within the group and more importantly encourage individual input (Bass, 1985). By letting the individuals know that their own input is highly valued, the subordinates are more likely to share their ideas and other input and therefore, an individual is better able to make use of their coworkers’ input. Homan et al. (2007) have found that information was more elaborated on, when the people were more convinced of the positive value of diversity. This is something that a transformational leader could be stimulating and thus thereby enhancing the sharing of unique information which benefits the creative process. The third and last hypothesis is formulated as follows:
H3: The relation between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity will be stronger when transformational leadership is high and weaker when transformational leadership is low.
13 Attitude towards diversity Individual Creativity Transformational Leadership
Figure 1. Conceptual Model displaying the three hypotheses
METHOD
Sample
A total of 104 employees participated in this research, of which 84 were team members and 20 team leaders. This includes 24 teams with all a team leader. There are 15 different companies, ranging from small to large sizes, all based in the Netherlands. The teams are active in different departments in the companies, ranging from sales teams to top management teams. Thus, the sample is rather heterogeneous, still, the teams were homogenous in terms of ethnicity, only 6 out of the 84 respondents were not of Dutch origin. For this study the actual diversity or heterogeneity in the team matters less, since the focus is being placed on attitude towards diversity. Therefore, it is less relevant whether the sample is heterogeneous or homogenous. The team leaders have provided the names of their team members. Everyone was asked to participate on a voluntary basis. Reminders have been sent out twice to increase the response rate.
The sample consists of 57 men (67,9 %) and 26 women (31%), with one missing value. Of the 20 leaders, four are female (20%) and 16 male (80%). The average age of the team members is 39,5 years old and of the team leaders 44,5. Of the team members 15 participants had a high school diploma (17,8%), 22 respondents finished intermediate
H1
H3
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vocational education (MBO in the Netherlands, 26,2), 33 respondents finished higher vocational education (HBO in the Netherlands, 39,3%) and 12 participants have a university degree (14,3%). As for the team leaders, 6 undertook intermediate vocational education (30%), 12 finished higher vocational education (60%) and two have an university degree (10%). A total of 137 members and 22 leaders were invited, this results in an overall response rate of 65,4% (104 members out of 159 filled the questionnaire out). Separate response rates for the team members results in 61,3% (84 out of 137 invited) and for the team leaders 90,9 (20 out of the 22 invited), the latter figure standing out, because it is extremely high.
Procedure
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(Brislin, 1986). Employees were also asked their age, gender, educational level and job tenure.
Measures
Attitude towards Diversity. This construct was analysed by using the 16-item Attitude
Diversity Workgroup Scale by van Oudenhoven-van der Zee (Paulus, Baruah, Parthasarthy & Nakui, 2010). Factor analysis resulted in the elimination of eight items which distorted the reliability of the scale. These items were eliminated because they did not add to a simple factor structure or they did not have a primary loading of .4 or above. The Cronbach Alpha for the residual 8-item scale is 0.86. Sample items include “Working in diverse groups can
increase one’s understanding of those who are different from me” and “I find interacting with people from different backgrounds very stimulating”. Respondents answered on a five point Likert scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree.
Individual Creativity. This construct was measured by asking the team leaders to judge
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Participants were asked to indicate their answers on a five point Likert scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree.
Transformational Leadership. The Full Range Leadership Theory of Bass (1985) was
operationalized in the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ). This questionnaire includes several leadership styles and is the most commonly used instrument to measure leadershipstyles (Antonakis, Avolio & Sivasubramaniam, 2003). Den Hartog (1997) transformed the questionnaire into a list of questions to be answered by the subordinates, this form is chosen the most in studies. Stuart (2005) uses 15 items to measure transformational leadership, three items to fit five dimensions of this leadership style. The first three items concern the social charisma of the supervisor, whether he or she displays confidence and power. The next three items deal with whether the leader focuses on keeping morale high and stresses a common goal. The third dimension deals with the ability of the leader to stimulate and motivate the subordinates. Fourth, the way in which subordinates are being challenged to think out of the box and find solutions to difficult problems. The last three items measure the degree to which the leader pays attention to the personal wellbeing of the subordinates and supports them.
17 Control variables
Age forms a control variable in this research since it has been proven in previous research that this has a positive relation with innovation (Hitt et al., 1997, Jung et. al, 2003), therefore it might also have an effect on creativity. Gender was also chosen as evidence exists that females experience higher levels of creativity (Dudek, Stobel, & Runco, 1993; Matud, Rodriguez & Grande, 2007). Lastly, level of education was included to prevent this from affecting the relationship between the independent and dependent variables. According to Amabile (1998) creativity is determined by the accumulated creative thinking skills and expertise based on formal education and experience.
Common Method Bias
In order to minimize the potential common method bias, the data collection was done by supervisor and subordinate ratings. To be more precise, the leaders judged the behavior of their team members and these subordinates rated their leaders on the items for transformational leadership. The supervisors were the direct leaders of the team members, hence they were adequate raters of the creativity of the subordinates. The team members in turn had sufficient interactions with the leaders to evaluate them on their leadership style.
Factor Analysis and Regression
18 Bartlett’s test of sphericity was significant (χ2
(1331.4) = 406, p < .001). After elimination of cross-loaded items, the communalities were all above .4 (see Appendix A), this confirmed that each item shared some common variance with the other items. These results show that the factor analysis was suitable. After the factor analysis the Cronbach’s Alpha was determined for the three variables to determine the reliability of these measures.
The three hypotheses have been tested using hierarchical multiple regression analyses. The dependent variable that has been entered is individual creativity. The other variables have been entered into the regression analysis in three hierarchical steps: (1) the control variables, (2) attitude towards diversity and transformational leadership and (3) the interaction term transformational leadership multiplied by attitude towards diversity. The control variables, the independent variable and the moderator have all been standardized, the z-scores were used in the above mentioned steps.
RESULTS
Descriptive Statistiscs
19 Table 1
Descriptives and Correlations
Variable M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6
1. Individual Creativity 3.09 .8 (.90)
2. Transformational Leadership 3.43 .78 .46 ** (.94)
3. Attitude towards Diversity 3.64 .61 .13 .12 (.86) 4. Age 39.5 11.51 -.20 -.09 -.12 5. Gender 1.3 .49 .14 -10 .29 ** -.70
6. Education level 6.02 1.85 .07 -.12 .02 -.69 .07 Alpha coefficients are on the diagonal, in parentheses
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed). *. Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
Hypothesis testing
Hierarchical multiple regression was used to test the hypothesis, the results can be seen in table 2. The first model including only the control variables, explains 5% of the variance (R²= 0.05, n.s.). The second model including transformational leadership and attitude towards diversity explains an additional 20% (∆R²= .20, p< 0.05). The third model including the moderating effect explained an extra 6% of the variance (R²= 0.06, p< 0.05).
Hypothesis 1 states that there is a positive relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity. After regression and controlling for age, gender and education level there appeared to be no evidence for such a relation. Therefore, there exists no support for the first hypothesis and it is thus rejected.
Hypothesis 2 states that there is a positive relationship between transformational leadership and individual creativity. After controlling for age, gender and education level, regression showed evidence for such a relation (b=0.36, P<0.001). Therefore, this highly significant result allows for the hypothesis to be accepted.
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moderating effect of transformational leadership. However it is not exactly in line with what was hypothesized. It appears that there is a significant negative moderating effect of transformational leadership (b=-0.23, p=<0.05). Therefore, the hypothesis should not be accepted, however this result does require further exploration.
Table 2 Regression Analysis Individual Creativity Step Variable 1 2 3 1 Age -.14 -.07 -.07 Gender .15 .08 .16 Education level .02 .06 .05 2 Attitude towards Diversity .04 .16
Transformational Leadership .36*** .45 *** 3 Attitude towards Diversity -.23*
X Transformational Leadership R² .05 .25* .31* ∆R² .05 .20* .06* * p< 0.05 ** p< 0.01 *** p< 0.001
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rejection of the third hypothesis, but at the same time provides the ingredients for further discussion and interpretation.
Figure 2 .Graphical representation of the simple slope analysis
DISCUSSION
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Although it must be added that whenever transformational leadership is high, individual creativity will also be high. Secondly, when transformational leadership is low, there is a very strong relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity. This was not exactly in line with what was hypothesized, but does opens up room for discussion.
Theoretical Implications
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be the attitude rather the actual diversity which determines the resulting creativity level. The attitude in itself then plays no significant role, whereas the actual diversity does.
Another explanation can be found in the level difference between individual and team creativity. Most research focusing on transformational leadership, diversity and creativity has been on the team level (e.g. Shin & Zhou, 2003; De Vries & Homan, 2008; Kearney & Gerbert, 2009). Considering that it has been established that the advantage of diversity is team creativity, it might be that this is the reason for why there is no relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity. Creativity requires on the one hand ‘the availability of a wide array of information and perspectives, but it also requires that team members work effectively together to share the information and perspectives they possess, to provide one another with intellectual stimulations and to cooperate with one another in coming up with new and better ideas’ (Shin & Zhou, 2003: 1710). Thus, it is possible that it is exactly this link between the actual team diversity as just was discussed and overall team creativity that holds, and the individual level of attitude towards diversity and individual creativity which does not.
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then leads to creativity. In this line of reasoning, when creativity is (partly) determined by expertise, personality and motivation, it does not need to matter whether or not someone’s attitude towards diversity is negative or positive. In that it does not matter for that individual whether he requires someone else’s input, but rather that he draws from his own expertise, ability to think creative and intrinsic motivation. Mumford and Hunter (2005) reason that traits such as openness and flexibility are important in the exploration that is required for creative thinking. They add that, conscientiousness and criticality also help in the analysis and evaluation of ideas.
In addition, Zhou and Oldham (2001), have used the Creative Personality Scale, to test the relationship between a creative personality and creativity. They have found that a creative personality does lead to higher creative outcomes. Thus, someone’s attitude towards diversity then is not so important, rather the creative personality that matters more. Oldham and Cummings (1996) found that supportive supervisory behaviors, as is the case in transformational leadership, in combination with creative personality traits leads to more creative outcomes.
The second hypothesis stated the positive relationship between transformational leadership and individual creativity. In line with other research, this was indeed found by the present study as well. It turns out that transformational leaders are able to stimulate and motivate the creative potential that resides in individuals. The transformational leader is able to ‘promote an understanding and deeper appreciation of different ideas’ (Kahai et al. 2003:503). Cooperation is stressed and by challenging each other’s input the members can focus on the weaknesses in others’ input, thereby thinking of new and creative alternative solutions.
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However, here the surprising effect of the study arises. When transformational leadership is high, there appears to be no significant result between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity. Under the other condition, when transformational leadership is low or absent, there is a very strong relationship. I will return to this latter point later, first I would like to address the condition in which transformational leadership is high. The nonexistence of the relationship under this condition might be explained by the argument that was already presented above. Since transformational leadership and actual diversity are known for their effects on the team creativity level, it is possible that this effect does not exist so much on the individual level. That it is the actual diversity which results in higher creativity and which is best stimulated in teams by the transformational leader who stimulates the cooperation between coworkers, with the higher creativity being the output of the leaders effort.
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compelling vision throughout the organization. According to Gumusluoglu (2009) this creates a climate in which employees feel challenged and energized to seek creative solutions in their jobs. Transformational leaders can achieve higher levels of creativity among their subordinates since they articulate a vision that motivates the followers and at the same time, increases their willingness to perform beyond expectations and again challenges them to adopt creative work processes (Mumford et al. 2002). Hence, positive or negative attitude, with high transformational leadership this is not so much an issue anymore.
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(2009), they state that because of the nature of creative people (e.g. autonomous, achievement oriented, self-confident, dominant, emotionally stable, etcetera) it is common belief that leadership influence is not always necessary.
It is striking that people with a positive attitude towards diversity share the qualities often found in creative people. In terms of the Big Five personality traits for example, creative people and people with a positive attitude towards diversity both are high in openness to experience (Shiner, 1998; Dollinger, Urban & James, 2004; Bouncken et al. 2008). Both are also found to be high in extraversion and agreeableness (Graziano & Ward, 1992; King, McKee Walker, & Broyles, 1996; Bouncken et al. 2008). Extraversion refers to sociable and assertive people, and agreeableness to people who are cooperative and loyal. These similarities might form a possible explanation as to why there is such a strong relationship without the interference of a transformational leader.
Managerial Implications
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openness to experience) were significantly related to diversity attitudes. Therefore in recruiting members for diverse teams, a Big Five personality test might lead to the selection of people who in any case are the most likely to have a positive attitude towards diversity. Which in fact, may be the first step towards the creation of a good climate for diversity ánd creativity.
In addition, an environment in which there is a negative attitude towards diversity may use diversity training within the organization, complemented by training to improve awareness of the strategic value that is potentially present in the diverse teams, which could then assist in increasing pro social behaviors and liking toward out-group members (Stephan & Finlay 1999; Nesdale et al., 2005). Then the environment may be more cohesive and employees are more likely to share and exchange ideas, so as to enhance creativity.
Lastly, since it has become clear that transformational leadership will lead to higher creativity, managers could receive training that focuses on the features of transformational leadership. Also, it can be rather expensive for organizations to deal with ineffective management of diversity, these costs for example are turnover, absenteeism, lawsuits and low morale (Black and Gregersen, 1999; Robinson & Dechant, 1997). Therefore, employees should be trained to adopt behaviors for successful interaction with their diverse coworkers, this is vital for organizational effectiveness (Sawyer, Strauss & Yan, 2005).
Limitations, Strengths and Future Research
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complex relations and to overcome the shortcoming of using cross-sectional data for analyzing relationships that are in fact dynamic.
Secondly, the sample is highly heterogeneous which makes generalizability difficult. Besides, the relatively small size of the sample also contributes to this generalizability issue. In addition, the companies are all Dutch, it is likely that diversity has different effects depending on the country in which the study was carried out (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2005). Besides these limitations the strength of this study should also be pointed out. By having the leaders judge the creativity of their subordinates and by having the subordinates rate the extent of transformational leadership features of their leader, common method bias was minimized. This prevented from common method bias due to a common rater such as social desirability and leniency (Meade, Watson & Kroustalis, 2007).
Future studies should focus on the attitude towards diversity construct, as so much is still unknown about this complicated variable. It is worth knowing how much leaders or training are able to influence someone’s attitude. It is also worthwhile to repeat this study with a larger sample, to see whether the results then still hold or change. Above all, research should focus on the type of leadership that bridges the attitude towards diversity and creativity constructs. We know that in the absence of transformational leadership the relation is strong, but there might be a different style that is better suited to deal with attitude towards diversity.
CONCLUSION
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a moderator which was expected to strengthen the relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity.
For the hypothesized direct relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity, no evidence was found. There did appear to be a strong significant relationship between transformational leadership and attitude towards diversity. Under high transformational leadership there was no relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity, though creativity remained high no matter the negative or positive attitude. Under low transformational leadership there did appear to be a strong relationship between attitude towards diversity and individual creativity.
Probably the most important finding of this research is that transformational leadership is appropriate for achieving higher levels of individual creativity. Which ultimately benefits the team and organization as a whole. Some questions do remain as to the attitude towards diversity concept, a direct relationship between this variable and individual creativity did not exist. Level differences, individual and team, might form an explanation for this. However, more research is required as to what really are the results of a positive and negative attitude. This study needs to be replicated in a larger sample to know for sure that it does not impact individual creativity or team creativity. Still, the fact that transformational leadership enhances individual creativity remains and this should help organization by managing their workforce with the transformational leadership philosophy.
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41 APPENDIX A
Table 1
Factor Loadings for Exploratory Factor Analysis With Varimax Rotation before elimination of cross-loaded items
Scale Factor
1 2 3
TL My leader instills pride in working together with him/her (7) .84 .18 .08
My leader is sincerely interested in the development of his/her subordinates (14) .83 .10 -.10 My leader listens to issues that are important to me (13) .81 .06 -.03 My leader keeps moral in the department high (6) .80 .25 .05
My leader enhances my enthusiasm towards work assignments (8) .79 .26 -.11
My leader serves as a role model (3) .77 .28 .24
In my opinion he/she is a symbol of success and performance (2) .76 .29 .26 My leader takes my personal wellbeing into account (15) .75 .10 -.03
My leader inspires me to accomplish more than I could have done without him/her (9) .74 .26 .16 My leader is able to get people to put common interests before one's self-interest (5) .73 .44 .14 My leader displays power and confidence (1) .68 .34 .11
My leader creates the feeling of working together towards an important mission/task (4) .68 .48 .15 My leader asks me questions that encourage me to think about the way I do things (11) .54 .43 .08 My leader asks me to find solutions when there are problems (12) .40 .23 .22 My leader stimulates me to solve problems myself (10) .34 .30 .16
IC He/She often suggests ideas for work improvement -.07 .8 .01 He/She offers solutions to unproductive rules and policies .24 .52 .02 He/She frequently changes the manner of work to increase his/her efficiency .20 .83 -.10 He/She often suggest new ideas to others .10 .85 .13 He/She offers innovative solutions to work problems .10 .77 .02 He/She mobilizes support for innovative ideas .28 .76 .07 He/She transforms innovative ideas into practical work applications .22 .82 .07
ATD For complicated problems, diverse groups will be able to solve the problem more easily -.45 .12 .36 I don’t enjoy working with people who come from other countries .36 -.20 .03
In general, I prefer socializing with people like myself .31 -.13 .25 I prefer working with people who are very similar to me -.21 .13 .04 Conversations in diverse groups tend to be somewhat uncomfortable -.15 .02 -.14 Diverse groups can provide useful feedback on one’s ideas .07 -.03 .87
The experience of working with diverse group members will prepare me to be a more effective .00 -.10 .85
employee in an organization
Solutions to complex problems require groups with diverse experiences or backgrounds .04 .03 .78 The experiences of group members who come from different countries can be helpful in groups
that are trying to generate novel ideas
-.05 .18 .77
I find interacting with people from different backgrounds very stimulating .04 .05 .70
Working in diverse groups can increase my understanding of those who are different from me .29 .01 .64
Groups whose members are diverse will be more creative .04 .08 .60
42
Differences in political ideology within groups can stimulate one’s own thinking .13 .01 .48
I prefer to socialize with people from my own ethnic group -.01 -.06 -.29 It is easier to be motivated when working with people who are like me -.09 -.02 .09
Table 2
Factor Loadings for Exploratory Factor Analysis With Varimax Rotation after elimination of cross-loaded items
Scale Factor
1 2 3
TL My leader instills pride in working together with him/her .87 .10 .06
My leader is sincerely interested in the development of his/her subordinates .84 .03 -.12 My leader listens to issues that are important to me .83 .18 -.14 My leader keeps moral in the department high .83 -.01 -.04
My leader enhances my enthusiasm towards work assignments .82 .18 .04
My leader serves as a role model .81 .20 .24
In my opinion he/she is a symbol of success and performance .79 .23 .22 My leader takes my personal wellbeing into account .77 .04 -.04
My leader inspires me to accomplish more than I could have done without him/her .76 .20 .14 My leader is able to get people to put common interests before one's self-interest .75 .38 .14 My leader displays power and confidence .74 .26 .09
My leader creates the feeling of working together towards an important mission/task .71 .44 .14 My leader asks me questions that encourage me to think about the way I do things .59 .36 .05 My leader asks me to find solutions when there are problems .46 .14 .21
IC He/She often suggests ideas for work improvement -.04 .84 .03 He/She offers solutions to unproductive rules and policies .25 .53 .03 He/She frequently changes the manner of work to increase his/her efficiency .28 .80 -.13 He/She often suggest new ideas to others .16 .85 .16 He/She offers innovative solutions to work problems .15 78 .05 He/She mobilizes support for innovative ideas .31 .76 .07 He/She transforms innovative ideas into practical work applications .26 .82 .07
ATD Diverse groups can provide useful feedback on one’s ideas .09 -.07 .86
The experience of working with diverse group members will prepare me to be a more effective employee in an organization
-.01 -.09 .86
Solutions to complex problems require groups with diverse experiences or backgrounds .07 -.01 .78
The experiences of group members who come from different countries can be helpful in groups that are trying to generate novel ideas
-.04 .19 .77
I find interacting with people from different backgrounds very stimulating .02 .08 .72
Working in diverse groups can increase my understanding of those who are different from me .031 -.04 .64
Groups whose members are diverse will be more creative .05 .08 .61
Workgroups with members from different backgrounds are more likely to be effective -.36 .26 .50
Differences in political ideology within groups can stimulate one’s own thinking .12 .03 .49
Eigenvalues 8.75 5.1 4.78
Percentage of variance explained 29.2 17.1 15.9
43 APPENDIX B
Table 3
Simple Slope Regression (1 SD above z-score)
Individual Creativity Step Variable 1 2 3 1 Age -.01 -.01 -.01
Gender .15 .08 .16 Education level .02 .06 .05 2 Attitude towards Diversity .04 -.02
Transformational Leadership .36*** .45 *** 3 Attitude towards Diversity -.23*
X Transformational Leadership R² .05 .25* .25 ∆R² .05 .20* .00 * p< 0.05 ** p< 0.01 *** p< 0.001 Table 4
Simple Slope Regression (1 SD below z-score)
Individual Creativity Step Variable 1 2 3 1 Age -.01 -.01 -.01
Gender .15 .08 .16 Education level .02 .06 .05 2 Attitude towards Diversity .04 .34*
Transformational Leadership .36*** .45 *** 3 Attitude towards Diversity -.23*
